


memento mori

by etymology



Category: Killing Eve (TV 2018)
Genre: F/F, Hurt/Comfort, hurt!villanelle, i started writing this before ep 8 aired so uhhhhh, not canon compliant at all really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-28
Updated: 2018-05-28
Packaged: 2019-05-06 06:35:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14636105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/etymology/pseuds/etymology
Summary: In the end, it wasn’t Villanelle who killed Konstantin.(Or, an alternate episode 8 in which Villanelle gets injured and Eve tends to her wounds. Canon compliant up until episode 7.)





	memento mori

//

In the end, it wasn’t Villanelle who killed Konstantin.

They were in the hallway of a Russian hotel, and they could not afford anyone walking in on a scene like this: with Konstantin holding a wounded Villanelle in an chokehold with one arm, and a gun to her head with the other, and Eve pointing another gun in his direction, all of them yelling at each other for one reason or another.

Eve wanted to take Konstantin in for questioning, Konstantin wanted to leave the building without Villanelle chasing after him to put a bullet in his skull, and Villanelle—well, Villanelle just wanted to do her job.

“I _will_ kill her,” said Konstantin, digging the gun even further into the side of Villanelle’s head. Her neck was already craned as far as it would go, and Eve watched as she tried to swallow.

“You can _try_ to kill me, but chances are, you will not succeed,” said Villanelle, ever the smartass, even when she was literally being held at gunpoint, by the man who had just shot her in the shoulder. The wound hadn’t even dried yet, and she was being clever with him, because of course she was.

“Would you? Kill one of your own?” asked Eve, holding her own gun in their general direction. Well, technically, it was Carolyn’s gun, because she had given in her service weapon when she had quit her job.

Her job, which had required that she know the basics of how to handle a gun, but all of that had happened at a shooting range; she had never even aimed a gun at anything living and breathing, let alone pulled the trigger. She had never fired her service weapon, either.

“Do you _really_ want to find that out, Eve Polastri?” he asked.

She couldn’t risk him hurting Villanelle, but she couldn’t exactly shoot at the one lead that they had, especially since Carolyn had up and vanished into thin air. Plus, she wasn’t exactly that good of a shot when she was _calm_ , let alone when her hand was shaking and there was blood rushing to her head that made it hard to hear anything but her pulse in her ears.

“No, I don’t,” said Eve, truthfully. She had been trained in hostage negotiation, but she might have been hungover for the first lecture, which, of course, had meant that she had been lost for the duration of the semester. Either way, she was sure that she wasn’t supposed to tell the guy holding the gun to someone’s head that he had the upper hand.

“Aww, she likes you, Villanelle,” he said, turning to Villanelle again, grin plastered to his face. Villanelle struggled to get out of his grip, to no avail. “It’s so sweet that you’ve got yourself a little girlfriend, but you should know better than to mix business with pleasure, _yozhik_.”

“You better shoot him before I break his stupid neck,” said Villanelle, looking directly at her. Eve knew that under normal circumstances, the assassin would have been capable of doing just that, but with one arm seemingly out of commission because of the bullet that had shattered her shoulder, it seemed like Konstantin had finally managed to reach Villanelle’s level and was easily restraining her.

“How easily you forget the situation that you’ve landed yourself in, Villanelle,” said Konstantin, tapping Villanelle’s head with the edge of his gun hard enough that Eve could hear it knock against the girl’s skull. “You are in no position to break my neck, I assure you.”

“You hit me with that gun one more time and I promise you, I will empty that entire clip into your wife and children,” said Villanelle, voice restrained because of Konstantin’s hold on her neck.

“Okay, look. How about we all put our weapons down?” said Eve, hoping for some kind of resolution that involved less bloodshed than their current situation seemed to suggest in their very near future.

The longer they stood there, the bigger the chance of being interrupted by some hotel employee who could end up being collateral damage, at this rate.

“You go first,” said Konstantin, smiling at her the same way he had smiled when she had told him that Villanelle had wanted to eat dinner with her over breakfast with Carolyn. “A show of trust from the British Intelligence.”

“How about you put yours down first, seeing as how you’ve been lying about who you are for the entirety of my trip here, which would imply that I am the more trustworthy of either one of us,” said Eve, because she was starting to get tired of holding the gun up and this conversation had lasted way longer than she had expected it to last.

“Oh, she’s got you there,” said Villanelle, trying to look back at Konstantin, and ending up tightening his grip on her neck by accident. If she kept wriggling so much, she was going to choke within five minutes. She had already gone slightly purple.

“That _was_ quite good. Kind of threatening,” said Konstantin, looking down at the assassin. “I can see why you like her.”

“She has many redeeming qualities,” said Villanelle, and Eve watched as she shrugged casually, and Konstantin’s grip on her neck loosened. Villanelle stared at Eve and _winked_ at her, like she had just shared a secret between the two of them, and it wasn’t until a split second later that Eve noticed why.

Villanelle was tapping her foot on the floor, not in an obvious way that would have made Konstantin suspicious, not from his angle, but Eve could tell that Villanelle was trying to show her something. Eve watched as Villanelle lifted her leg up for a brief second, never once breaking eye contact with her.

“Put your gun down, Eve Polastri,” said Konstantin, sounding bored.

“Okay, fine. You win. I’ll put it down,” said Eve, leaning down and lowering her gun to the floor slowly. “But I hope you’ll take this as a sign that I trust you to put yours down too.” The gun was about a foot off the ground, when she stopped and said, “Oksana, _now_.”

At Eve’s word, Villanelle pushed her feet into the ground and jumped up, letting Konstantin’s grip on her neck hold her up until such a time that he figured out what was going on, and Eve pulled the trigger and watched Konstantin go down, hitting the floor on his side, and giving Eve his back.

“Put it _down_ ,” Konstantin growled over at Eve, looking back at her, and she watched the blood seeping out of his leg, wondered how the hell he was expecting to get out of this scot-free, which seemed to be a trademark of his.

Konstantin was still holding onto Villanelle, and he seemed to have gotten a better hold of her now that he knew that she had managed to come up with that plan while in his grip. His arm was jutting out, and Eve saw Villanelle’s hand out from under him, and it looked _mangled_ , like they had landed on it.

Villanelle hadn’t even cried out.

“Put the gun down or I _will_ kill her,” said Konstantin, and she had never really gotten familiar with weapons, but even she knew the sound of a gun being cocked, and that just would not do.

Eve raised her arm, the one holding the gun, and pointed it at the back of Konstantin’s head. She had never been a good shot, but she didn’t need to be to hit the back of a man’s head who was standing five feet away from her.

She shot him once, and watched as his body went limp instantly, then watched Villanelle’s arm push him to the side, his body rolling over and spilling even more blood onto the carpet. Whoever had this place insured better have written in the carpets, because they seemed really expensive.

“You shot him,” said Villanelle, holding onto her shoulder and looking down at Konstantin. “Clean shot, too.”

“Yes, and you can be sure that someone _heard_ that, so we have to go,” said Eve, walking over to Villanelle and taking her jacket off, holding her hand out for the other woman to take.

“Only idiots would go _towards_ gunfire,” said Villanelle, taking her hand, and letting Eve help her put the jacket on—to hide the blood from passers by. “You assume too much that other countries are just like yours.”

Eve rolled her eyes, but still wiped blood off her face and started walking towards the closest exit she could find.

//

“You know, they will just send another one,” said Villanelle, as Eve sat down next to her on the bus. It was the fastest way of getting out of the area, that Eve could think of, that didn’t involve leaving eye witnesses like taxi drivers, since most nobody cared about what anyone ever did on public transport.

“Shut up and show me your hand,” said Eve, holding out her own hand, and waiting for Villanelle’s.

Villanelle, for her part, sighed, but put her palm over Eve’s, as a dance partner would have. Eve blinked away that thought and turned Villanelle’s hand over gently, and noticed the other woman’s slight wince as she did so.

“It’s definitely sprained,” said Eve, looking at the bruise forming along the meat of her thumb, way harsher a colour than it had any right to be, given that it had only been ten, twenty minutes old.

“My hand is, unfortunately, broken,” said Villanelle, holding up her other hand to point out to Eve where exactly her hand was broken. “I have broken this bone before. I know the feeling.”

“How’s your shoulder?” asked Eve, shifting in her seat. She wondered if she should have been putting some pressure against it, but just as she lifted her hand, Villanelle leaned away from her.

“Through and through,” replied Villanelle, shoving her back up against the bus.

“Does it hurt?” asked Eve, knowing full well that she was asking a stupid question that she already knew the answer to, but not having any idea of what else to say.

“The hand is worse,” said Villanelle, and then she pulled her hand away from Eve’s, and sat facing the window for the rest of the trip.

//

Villanelle was the one who decided their stop, and almost tripped over Eve in her haste to get out of the bus, and Eve only realised what she was heading towards when she noticed that she had been to the place herself days prior.

“This is where Anna lives,” said Eve, stopping dead in her tracks.

“How do you know about Anna?” said Villanelle, over her shoulder. She hadn’t stopped walking. Eve sighed and fastened her step, trying to catch up to the assassin. “You know, there used to be such a thing as privacy.”

“Don’t you think,” said Eve, grabbing ahold of Villanelle’s good arm to keep her from walking farther than she already had, “that showing up after almost a decade, with a broken hand and a bleeding shoulder might traumatize her more than you already have by killing and castrating her husband?”

Villanelle frowned.

“Not really, no,” said Villanelle, expression indicating that she really didn’t think that her sudden reappearance would have any negative effect on Anna. “Besides, she has something that belongs to me.”

“The passport,” said Eve, automatic.

Villanelle blinked at her. “She found it.”

“No,” said Eve, carefully. Villanelle raised an eyebrow, and motioned for her to continue. “She never even noticed the passport.”

“She never wore the jacket,” said Villanelle, lowering her gaze. She looked almost heartbroken at the thought, and Eve had no doubt in her mind that the woman was, in her own way, hurt, that this woman hadn’t worn her gift. Villanelle looked up at her then, and tilted her head a little. “But _you_ did, didn’t you?”

“I- I didn’t, no,” said Eve, averting her own gaze. She somehow felt like telling Villanelle that she had pressed the coat to her face and pictured Villanelle sending it to _her_ instead of Anna, was not entirely appropriate, given their repertoire. “I folded it and felt the plastic.”

“And where is the passport now? The credit cards?”

Eve narrowed her eyes, trying not to be too surprised that Villanelle knew she wouldn’t have just left the passport with Anna upon discovering it.

“It’s in my suitcase, all of it,” said Eve, sighing. Villanelle seemed poised to keep walking in the direction of Anna’s flat, however. Like a tightly wound coil, she was itching to go see Anna still. “You still want to go see her, don’t you.”

“No,” said Villanelle, in the most defensive tone Eve had ever heard her take. Villanelle shrugged, then winced, and grasped her shoulder. She even started walking away from her previous destination, presumably to sell the act. “Why would I _want_ to go see her?”

“I knew it,” said Eve, smugly. She followed behind her, and held out her hand for a taxi. They were far enough from the hotel that it would have been fine to take one to Kenny’s computer room. The taxi kept going.

“And what is it that you think you know, Eve Polastri?”

“Anna _asked_ you to kill her husband. You could have left a spare passport anywhere in the country, but you chose to send it to _her_.”

Eve didn’t notice that Villanelle had frozen, stood rooted to her spot, until Villanelle asked her, “Did she tell you that?”

“No, not exactly,” said Eve, truthfully. Anna hadn’t said as much, in so many words. “But if the woman who had killed and castrated _my_ husband had sent _me_ hundreds of letters, I wouldn’t have kept them in my bedroom, underneath my bed.” Villanelle smiled, softly. Eve pointed a finger at her. “That was not an invitation to kill Niko.”

“Wasn’t it, though?” asked Villanelle, grinning like a cheshire cat at the thought of murder.

“Don’t,” said Eve, taking on a serious tone. She couldn’t even think of the possibility of having Villanelle do anything to Niko.

“Not even a little maiming?” she asked, pouting, like some sort of assassin kitten who was trying to convince their owner to let them kill someone who had been mean to them.

“No maiming,” said Eve, trying to keep from finding the pout adorable. How on earth did she manage to look adorable while asking for permission to maim her husband.

“You’re no fun,” said Villanelle, sighing deeply. “But, _fine_. I will not harm a single hair on your stupid boyfriend’s _precious_ little head.”

“Husband,” corrected Eve, holding up her wedding ring out of habit. Niko had referred to himself as her boyfriend once, just after they had gotten engaged, and she had teased him relentlessly, to the point where raising her wedding ring and saying “fiancé,” and eventually, “husband,” had become a game of theirs.

“ _Husband_ ,” said Villanelle, in a mocking tone. The girl was not even attempting to hide her jealousy.

A taxi finally stopped for them, and Villanelle took Eve’s cue and didn’t say anything incriminating in the back of the car.

At least, not _that_ incriminating.

//

“Are you ever going to tell me about your bosses?” asked Eve, as they rounded towards Kenny’s computer-littered place and Eve had noticed that Villanelle hadn’t said anything since they had exited the car.

“You just killed my boss,” said Villanelle, deadpan.

“The other ones. _The Twelve_ ,” said Eve, and then decided to say to hell with it and give Villanelle the name of her own boss, well— _former_ boss, now. “Do you know Carolyn Martens?”

“The lady with the shitty hair?” asked Villanelle, automatically. “She visited me in the prison. Threatened to kill me if I didn’t tell her what I knew.”

“What did you tell her?” asked Eve.

“Nothing,” said Villanelle, snorting out a laugh. She looked at Eve, almost offended. “Do you really think I’m that stupid?”

Eve didn’t think she was stupid at all, actually. She had some doubts about her lack of intelligence, however, bringing Villanelle to where Kenny was just to give Villanelle her passport back.

//

She figured that she had made a really, really big mistake as soon as she walked into the computer room and Kenny spotted Villanelle, then proceeded to fall off his chair and start screaming his head off. His scream tapered off into a squeak after a short while, and then he started on another scream.

Villanelle looked at him like he was trying to explain literally any of his computer code to her, and then started yelling back at him, directly to his face, like an overgrown toddler.

Kenny screamed some more.

“Stop it,” said Eve, standing in between both of them, holding Villanelle away from Kenny, who seemed to be trying to phase into the wall, with how he was pressing himself against it.

“Please don’t murder me. I don’t deserve to die,” he said, voice hoarse from all the screaming. He closed his eyes and turned away from Villanelle. “I’ve never done anything worth being killed over. I mean, I did hack into NASA that one time, but I didn’t do anything malicious, I promise, I just wanted to see their space stuff. I’m not a bad person.”

“Kenny, calm down. She’s not going to kill anyone,” said Eve, reaching down to him.

“Can I _please_ kill him?” asked Villanelle, from behind her. Eve turned to glare at her, and by the tremor in her hands, she could tell that the woman was just itching to kill someone, _anyone_ , so she grabbed Villanelle’s wrist and shook her head.

“You’re not going to kill him. He’s good with computers, he’s resourceful.”

“I’m good with computers, too,” replied Villanelle, shrugging, and yet again, wincing at the pain.

“Kenny, get me a towel and some hot water. And disinfectant,” said Eve, turning to face the boy. He was pale as a ghost. “ _Now_ , Kenny, go.”

The boy scrambled up on his two legs and ran out from the room, holding onto the wall like the ground was going to cave in on them at any minute.

“You, _sit_ ,” she told Villanelle, as she breathed in and started rolling up her sleeves to the elbow. She had watched enough _Grey’s Anatomy_ to know exactly what to do in this exact situation, she was _prepared_.

The assassin narrowed her eyes at her, but eventually sat down on an office chair, instantly twirling around.

Eve grabbed Kenny’s hand sanitizer and headed to the adjoining bathroom, washing her hands and then pouring a generous dollop of sanitizer on her hands, rubbing thoroughly. She could hear Villanelle tapping her feet against the tiles in the other room. Eve grabbed an office chair on her way back to Villanelle, sliding it closer to the other woman.

“Are we going to play doctor?” said Villanelle, smirk playing across her lips. She leaned in conspiratorially and whispered, “I had no idea you were into roleplay, Eve.”

Eve rolled her eyes, and pushed her jacket—bloodstained, ruined—off of Villanelle’s shoulders, aware of how the other woman was gazing at her unabashedly as she did so. The blood had gotten stuck to the material, and she was going to need a pair of scissors. She examined the wound, and it seemed like the blood had started drying, which was a good enough sign.

“To tell you the truth, this is getting me a little hot and bothered,” said Villanelle. At first, Eve assumed she was teasing her yet again, but after spotting the blush spreading across her cheeks and trailing down her neck, she was certain that the other woman wasn’t lying about that.

“Sorry, sorry, I couldn’t find a towel,” said Kenny, as he stumbled into the room holding a pot full of water. Eve hoped that it, at least, was lukewarm. He set it down on the desk next to Villanelle, and nearly tripped over his own two feet in his haste to get out of the room. “I’ll go look for one again.”

“Open my suitcase,” said Eve, touching the water with a finger. It was warm enough, she supposed. “There’s a shirt in there, um, baby blue. Find it, and give it to me. Also, I’m going to need scissors.”

“Scissors, got you,” said Kenny, doing an excellent impression of someone who wasn’t about to shit their pants out of fear.

Villanelle could be quiet even when it wasn’t required of her to do so, which was.. surprising, to Eve. The woman had never really kept herself from speaking her mind, but she hadn’t said much of anything while Eve cleaned up the blood. The only time she spoke was when Eve made mistakes, and that was to guide her.

“No, dig the material in harder,” she said, as Eve had started disinfecting the wound. “It needs to be cleaned really well.”

Eve nodded, and pressed her fingers in even deeper, trying to ignore the way Villanelle’s breathing had gone harsh, like she was trying to keep herself from expressing pain.

“Thank you, Eve Polastri,” said Villanelle, as Eve taped the bandages shut with duct tape. “If it weren’t for you, I would probably be dead right now, rotting on that expensive carpet.”

“For what it’s worth, I’m glad you’re not rotting on any carpet,” said Eve, as she shoved the roll into her hand luggage for later use. She was hoping to get some proper surgical tape before she’d have to use it again, but just in case she didn’t.

“It’s worth a lot,” said Villanelle, turning a smile on her that Eve had only ever seen maybe thrice prior. Eve wondered how often she showed other people this smile, if ever. She thought that maybe Anna had seen this smile before.

“You’re welcome,” said Eve, voice low. “ _Oksana_.”

Villanelle rolled her eyes.

//

“Kenny, we need to get plane tickets to the UK,” she told Kenny, as she was cleaning up, pouring even more hand sanitizer on her hands for no reason other than she wanted to make sure that she wouldn’t have to clean up. “There’s a packet in my luggage, it has a passport. Make sure she gets in the same flight as us.”

“Um, the same flight?”

“Yes, preferably the same row, too,” said Eve, drying her hands on her waist. “I’m not going to put it past her to try to run away while we’re on a plane.”

“Is she in our custody?” asked Kenny.

“Well, not exactly, but, someone’s got to take care of her while she’s injured, right?”

“Right, well,” said Kenny, in his nervous voice. It was like his regular voice, but it had the charming effect of making her anxious for anything that he was about to say next. “She’s already left.”

Eve poked her head out of the bathroom.

“What.”

“She said she was going back home,” said Kenny, wincing as Eve tried not to stare him down as he spoke. “I just.. I thought we were friends with the assassin now, so it didn’t much matter if she left.”

“You thought it didn’t _matter_ -” Eve repeated, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Kenny, I need you to stop talking now.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, then noticed that he had just disobeyed her orders, and mimed zipping his mouth shut.

//

Eve received a parcel, seven days later.

She kept it hidden under her bed until she could open it without Niko interrupting her, and waited until he had gone out to buy milk—at her request, because she could only wait so long before he was out of the house—to pull it out and open it.

It was a passport, a fake one, except this one had her own picture in it, and the name that was listed opposite her photo was most certainly not _Eve Polastri_.

The enclosed note said, _For when you want to play another kind of game. - V._

//

**Author's Note:**

> someone save me from all these villaneve feelings i can't stop emoting
> 
> ps. eve polastri has done nothing wrong ever in her life


End file.
